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The Dreeson Incident(134)

By:Eric Flint & Virginia DeMarce




Besides, Missy was helping him design a records management system and compile a procedures manual, so a lot of the time they spent there wasn't private at all, but involved wandering through the manufacturing plant with clipboards. As she said, it wouldn't be as good a system as if he had been up-time and able to hire a professional consultant, but it would definitely be better than no system at all.



She had told him that one of the nice things about Lothlorien was that none of the staff looked at them cross-eyed, unlike Nani and Gran, who definitely did. The employees, she said, were mostly as friendly and helpful as they could possibly be, even when she plopped herself down on a stool and spent two hours watching how a process was carried out. Then watched it six times more, trying to figure out what parts of it needed to be standardized and recorded and which ones didn't.



He definitely didn't want to do anything that would cause her to break it off before they were finished with the procedures manual. Great Om, Stone, what a rationale.



On the other hand . . .



Out of the corner of his eye, he could see a handy pair of pruning shears leaning against a potting table. If he didn't have some rationale available, he would take them to the stupid handcuffs. The things were only plastic.



He didn't want to do anything that would cause her to break it off at all.



He kissed her again. She also had an eye on that vanishing sunlight. There was a kind of equation. The less time remaining, the fewer restrictions. This was a really rewarding kiss. Sort of an improved, expanded version.



He could live with the accessory. It wasn't a good thing, exactly, but it was sure better than a bad thing. They might as well make the most of the last ten minutes.



Plus, there was always hope. Once her mind finally decided to agree with her instincts, she had the key. More accurately, in the unlikely event that her mind ever decided to agree with her instincts, she had the key. Hope springeth eternal . . .





PART SEVEN





February 1635


In dubious battle on the plains of heaven





Chapter 42





Magdeburg, February 22, 1635


"This is actually quite boring," said Rebecca. "I had not expected that. Whatever else I thought 'election day' would be in a republic, 'boring' is not it."



Her husband Mike smiled. "Well, back up-time it would have been quite exciting. Every TV station breathlessly reporting the latest results, precincts closing, exit polls, the whole nine yards."



Rebecca frowned. "I detest that expression. 'The whole nine yards.' It makes no sense at all." Accusingly, she added: "And you use it frequently, too. But—you have explained this to me yourself—in football one must carry the ball ten yards before it makes a difference. So why is it not 'the whole ten yards'?"



As much as he adored his wife, there were times when Mike thought she was just a tad too obsessed with precision and perfection. "I don't know the answer, sweetheart. But I do know—for sure, you betchum—that it's 'the whole nine yards.' Not 'the whole ten yards.' "



A slight cough drew his attention and Becky's. Against one wall of the large room in a rented building that served the Fourth of July Party for its national campaign headquarters, Melissa Mailey was sitting on a couch holding hands with James Nichols. The two of them had come up to Magdeburg for the occasion.



She had that certain look on her face, that Mike remembered from the days she'd been one of his high school teachers.



That certain much-detested look. The one that prefaced the ignorant student about to be enlightened by the oh-so-god-damn-her-well-educated schoolmarm.



And—yep—sure enough, she began it all with a slight sniff.



"That's because it's almost certainly not a reference to football in the first place." (Here she clucked her tongue. Mike remembered that detested mannerism, too.)



"No, no." (And—yep—always the double negative. As if simply telling a dumbass kid that he didn't know squat once wasn't enough.)



"So what is it, then?" asked Becky.



For a moment—very brief moment—Melissa looked a little less than completely self-assured. "Well . . . nobody actually knows, for certain. It's a relatively recent expression, it seems. There's no reliably dated use of it prior to the 1960s, at least not in print, when it emerged into prominence in the space program."



Rebecca choked a little laugh. "I always find that so odd! 'No earlier than the 1960s'—which is to say, more than three centuries from now."



"But the most common theory is that it comes from military aviation and originated in the Second World War. The machine gun belts for most U.S. aircraft were twenty-seven feet long. So 'the whole nine yards' would have meant using up all your ammunition in a full and complete effort to strike at your enemy."